


For Nothing

by livethekind



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Reality, Gen, Post-Scratch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-13
Updated: 2011-03-13
Packaged: 2017-10-16 22:32:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/170093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livethekind/pseuds/livethekind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You’re not sure how to make everyone remember after the Scratch. So you remember it in your dreams, sometimes, when the world is ending. And now you really can't fix it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For Nothing

All your life you’ve spent trying to get out of someone’s shadow.

Of course it was Bro. You idolized him, but there was something you needed, something different. You couldn’t be a copy -- it wasn’t in you, wasn’t allowed by the fierce vein of independence that ran through your mind. The shades had helped (Ben Stiller was way more ironic than the animes, no matter what anyone said), but they hadn’t completely erased the fact that you were still the younger brother. Bro would always be better than you in something - swordsmanship, hashrap, irony, whatever - and you hated it. You couldn’t surpass him. He kicked your ass every time you tried.

Finally - it had only been a matter of time you supposed, though you would’ve liked to assume otherwise - Bro had met the ultimate match. It wasn’t fair. Immortal god versus game construct and human. He could have been a ninja in every sense of the word, and it wouldn’t have helped the inevitable. You knew, the first step you took into the future, that he was gone. You couldn’t locate him, and he didn’t want you to -- at least, until after he died.

You may have cried.

You don’t remember.

It wasn’t in the rules.

Now, you stand on the Beat Mesa. It’s taken so long to get here, so many loops through time and so many deaths that you helped to create. You have lived three days where there should only be one. Your friends think it’s aged you; you know Jade watches you carefully when she thinks you’re not looking, watching for signs of some inner collapse. But the face you project is carefully molded. No one will get through the facade unless you want them to, and right now you want more than anything to keep them out. They are your best friends, but you can’t trust yourself with emotion. Everything would fall apart, and they would stand there watching.

Looking down at the crack in the surface -- the Scratch, you remember -- you know it’s time to be in your brother’s shadow again. His sword had cracked the surface in a way yours couldn’t. You could never be as powerful as him, and it’s something like shame that bubbles up when you realize you’ll never be his equal. Swords are your niche, and yet when the moment comes, you have to use a different strife specibus to settle this. You hate yourself for it. You cannot use the powerful weapons that you’ve created; you must settle for the Quills of Echidna, taken victoriously from Jade’s denizen. This isn’t your specibus, you tell yourself. Rose lent you her needlekind purely for the sake of your victory and release. But it doesn’t seem right, to clutch a giant needle within your hand. You need the surety of leather and steel, the heaviness of a broadsword or the sleek finesse of a rapier. You don’t need this oversized knitting utensil (something you made sure to tell Rose, before you stepped on the Mesa). It’s not going to do you any good in the long run.

You know time is of the essence, or so Rose says, but you can’t help but pause and remember. You remember meeting some idiots on Pesterchum ( _hi dave, im jade!!! dude, chill, it’s just me from the forums, no big deal! Well, then, Strider. It seems I am indeed honored to make your acquaintance._ ). And then idiots became acquaintances, and acquaintances quickly turned into friends as you shared bits and pieces of your lives with each other. Every picture Jade sent you - of her island, her dog, herself - are saved on your computer, along with the snippets of fanfiction Rose thought you might enjoy and the logs of John telling you about SBURB, about cake and his father and everything. If you had time, you would go back and pick through these things. But your timetables have been taken by John, a precaution you know. They think you might try and fix things. And you probably would, if you knew what to do. That was your job, you were the Knight, and you failed them.

Failed yourself.

One last fistbump with John, a nod at Rose - snarky broad that she is - and finally, a hug with Jade. You’ve never given a hug before, or at least in your recent memory. The feeling of a girl crying against your chest is something you’ve never experienced until now. You’re not sure if you want to repeat the motion. It hurts, and not in a physical way. When she puts herself together again and pulls away, you turn back to the Scratch.

 _It’s you and me, Bro._

You take the needle in your hands (it’s almost like a sword, if you don’t think about it) and take a stance, a fighting stance. Rose snorts in the background and you consider whipping around to tell her to stop, but it’s too late for that and you don’t have enough time as it is and why would you stop her from having her last laugh? You’re not sure how to make everyone remember after the Scratch. You should know this, as the Knight, but you don’t. Yet another way that you’ve failed everyone.

You pray to whatever god is listening that they help, that they’ll remember you and let you live happy lives. But you don’t think the gods care about some kids in SBURB, in the Land of Heat and Clockwork, staring at a Scratch that could end them.

With your battle cry -- Bro always chided you, but it is one thing that really makes you unique -- you fling yourself at the Scratch, tearing downward into the Mesa. It splits with ease, and you draw the line, the crack, until it reaches the other side. A bright light flies through the air; it’s everywhere, and you fall off of the edge, arms outstretched, staring at the stars and Skaia until your world disappears. The Quill you dropped somewhere -- _what was the Quill, you’re having problems remembering_ \-- and you fall through endless space before there’s nothing. The last thing you remember is your friends’ faces, flashing before your eyes.

And then there’s silence, there’s the dark.

 _And you wake up._

\--

“Fuck, I had the freakiest dream last night. They just keep happing, don’t know why,” you tell the friend beside you as you walk home from school.

Your name is David Strider, though you go by Dave because it’s cooler and David is a nerd’s name. You’re not a nerd. Your parents refuse to call you by your nickname, but you guess that’s okay, since they’re decent as far as parents go. You don’t see them a lot. They’re scientists, they’re busy, but you entertain yourself with music and your iPod and sometimes your friends and your girlfriend.

“I did too! I think you were in it, I can’t really remember.” John Harley, your classmate and best friend (though he’s too dorky for you to tell him that outright) is chatting with you. You’re walking home from school, like always -- somehow, the four of you ended up skipping a grade, though you have no idea why. You’re all in high school, the vague reminiscent of middle school with more serious implications. You don’t mind it, but you’re bored almost every day in classes that teach you what you already know. You fail tests for the irony of the situation, rather than a lack of knowledge. Your teacher knows this.

In your dream, John had a different name, but you don’t remember it. He had the most power -- the small, dorky kid in the square glasses, buckteeth reflecting the light from some weird crack in some platform.

“Yeah same,” you agree. You’re meeting up with your other good friend Rose, and she stands at the corner, her face in a book. Her mother is a single parent, a professor in the university two towns over, and she spends her days painting her lips black and harboring a love for Lovecraftian horrors and psychology. Some people call her a goth, but they shut up when they see that she exceeds all expectations.

She isn’t valedictorian of your class for nothing.

“Where’s your girlfriend, Strider? Did you forget that she has robotics?” Her voice is sharp, and you wonder how she knows you’re there with a large book obscuring her vision.

“Nah, she’s coming. Just chill Lalonde, I’ve thought of everything. I am the coolest guy you’ll ever meet, and that means I’ve got everything under control.”

You didn’t, at one point. You remember the smell of ash as it fell from the sky, the heat of the lava and the realization that you were going to die, it was a dream _it was a dream_ \--

“Dave!”

A force crashes into you from behind, someone hugging you. A look over your shoulder reveals your best friend (your girlfriend, but you can’t admit it properly when she’s around) Jade Harley. She is the twin sister of John, and adorable as fuck. Nerdy, but you expected that -- she loves creating robots, making science work for her. Your teachers say she’s going far with that attitude, but when you sit on her porch and talk about life you know all she wants to do is build a greenhouse on some island no one knows about. You can’t blame her for that.

“Hey Jade. Sup?” You take hold of her hand now that she’s done trying to tackle you, and the circle is complete. The four of you stand on the corner, each immersed in their own reality. You had all talked about your dreams before, how similar they were. Rose made up some psychological bullshit answer and that was that. You didn’t disagree. It was freaky enough as it is.

Jade’s face was streaked with tears as she watched you, she _waited for you_ in a timeline that failed, she died and there was nothing you could do.

This is how you spend your days now, in the comfort of your friends and the security of your family. You dream about a brother you never had -- your parents tell you that your older brother died of complications several years before you came along. You are the lucky one. There is no one whose shadow you must stand in, however often you check. You are the hero of your own story, and you write it however you damn well please. You like to spend your hours looking at the weapons shop window with Jade -- somehow, this doesn’t creep you out, the fact that your girlfriend likes rifles as much as you like the swords. You can’t go in yet (not eighteen, not yet), but the two of you make plans for the future, where you’ll get the weapons you desire. You’ve never used a sword before, but to hell with the idea that you can’t learn. It’ll drive your parents crazy, and that’s what matters.

\---

On April 13th, 2009 you sit in the basement of your house, holding Jade against you. Her dog, Halley, is curled up in front of you, protecting you (though you doubt it will do much good). You’re not even sure how the dog got inside, but she’s here and she’s helping and like hell will you make her leave. Jade is crying into your shirt (a sensation from a dream, you remember, and it’s still as awkward as humanly possible at thirteen). You let her. You’re trying to protect her and you don’t know how.

Rose sits in a chair, reading. She says that she will read until the end, and you don’t say anything when you see the tears start to fall. She will deny them, you know, because you’re the same way. You’re too similar.

And John, your best friend. John stares out the basement window, watching the meteors crash into the ground, watching the fire rise out of next door buildings. Hearing the screams of the people who know the world is ending. When you tell him to get back over here, he shakes his head. He wants to remember, he says. He wants to remember the fire, the things he can’t fix. And he wants to remember the way he’s going to die, however morbid that sounded. The last joke’s on him, you suppose. He can do what he wants; you have a crying girl on your shoulder and another crying girl in a chair and you can’t do anything but wait. There was a time when you didn’t die. You can’t remember. You think it was a dream, and that dream sounds fucking perfect right now because you know when the meteor John says is headed for your house finally collides, you’ll only be a memory. You wish your dreams were reality.

You sit and wait for the world to end.


End file.
